The FBI is the most sophisticated law enforcement agency in the world, pursuing the most dangerous criminals.
“In Houston, Texas, a fifth-grade girl disappears from her neighborhood, a block from her home.”
“Your daughter’s out there and you, you can’t do anything to help her.”
“The bureau mobilizes. A desperate hunt for the kidnapper leads agents from Texas to Louisiana and back. We were dealing with a highly mobile sex offender who had now become a serial abductor.”
“Agents race to save a young girl and stop a sadistic predator before he strikes again.”
“We’re hoping each and every time we pick up that phone, this is the clue that’s going to bring this child back home. Who knows what’s going to happen?”
“Drop your weapons!”
“Houston, Texas, May 1st, 2001. It’s a typical Tuesday afternoon in May, and 11-year-old Leah Henry is on her way home from a busy day at school.”
“At 3:30 p.m., Leah is dropped at her neighborhood bus stop and begins her walk home, only a short block away.”
“Almost 2 hours later, Linda Henry grows concerned. Her daughter Leah isn’t home from school.”
“She immediately phones her ex-husband, Tim, hoping Leah’s with him.”
“Hello?”
“Did you pick up Leah? Where’s Leah?”
“And I’m going, ‘Well, she’s not here. She’s not with you?'”
“And she said, ‘Well, she’s not here.'”
“And we’re going, ‘Well, now she’s never done that. She’s just never done that. She’s supposed to be home by now. Why don’t I call the school and see if she’s there for some reason?'”
“All right, just hurry up.”
“I was a little irritated. What the heck is Leah up to? It’s been nearly a year since the Henrys divorced, but Tim still remains close to his daughters.”
“He may not live under the same roof anymore, but he knows Leah’s day-to-day routine.”
“The normal situation would be for her to take the bus home, but her mother would pick her up at times.”
“At times, I would…”
“Tim retraces his daughter’s steps, starting where the fifth grader attends classes for accelerated students.”
“Tim speeds to her school 6 miles away, but no one there has seen Leah.”
“There was just no explanation in my mind where she could be. I was just worried. What the heck has she had done? Where in the hell is she?”
“Increasingly distraught, Tim calls the Houston Police Department.”
“An officer does a quick canvas of the Henry neighborhood.”
“They get an early break. A neighbor tells police he saw a young girl matching Leah’s description get off the bus and then get into a small white car.”
“The news jolts Leah’s parents.”
“That was a very gut-wrenching moment. I knew that we had an abduction. I knew that was bad.”
“And I, I think I did go into a state of shock, because at that point I knew that was serious, serious, serious problem.”
“Leah’s case is turned over to the homicide division and their most experienced detectives.”
“Nothing is ever quite so tragic as a case that involves a child victim, and those cases are taken very personally by investigators. Nothing is approached more seriously than that.”
“While homicide detectives gear up for the investigation ahead, the Henrys reach out to their friends, family, anyone for help.”
“Word of Leah’s abduction reaches Gay Smither, a Houston mother who knows all too well what the Henrys are going through.”
“Our daughter, Laura, was abducted and murdered. She was missing for 17 days. When you know that your child is missing and you don’t know when, where your child is, it is absolutely the most paralyzing, terrifying moment in your life.”
“Gay and her husband, Bob, created the Laura Recovery Center to help families like the Henrys. The team mobilizes to aid in the search for Leah.”
“When your child is missing, you’ve got to turn every rock and every stone to find your child. You don’t have a second to wait.”
“Tim Henry’s instincts are telling him the same thing. When a friend alerts him that Leah has been sighted, he investigates the tip himself.”
“Somebody had spotted a young girl, Leah’s age, with some adults in the gas station near the house, so I went to that gas station. They showed me the tape.”
“The tape is fuzzy. The girl’s image is obscured, and Tim can’t be sure whether or not it’s Leah.”
“Just before midnight, a concerned citizen notifies the FBI of the possible abduction. The FBI assigns two of their top agents to Leah’s case: Special Agent Mark Young and his partner, Special Agent David Rash.”
“Agents Young and Rash quickly arrive at the Henry home to question Leah’s distraught parents.”
“Has she ever done this before?”
“She’s never done anything like this. She’s always on time. She wouldn’t go anywhere. She’s a very smart girl. She, she’s very responsible. She, she gets off the bus and she comes home.”
“They want to know more about Leah.”
“Are these the most recent pictures?”
“Our description of Leah was that she was a good student, an innocent person, and as far as our way of thinking, there was something wrong.”
“Tim tells agents about screening the security tape. They want to see it for themselves. But there’s a problem: the tape is locked away, and the owner, who has the only key, is at home asleep.”
“They call the owner up, said, ‘Come on down.'”
“And she said, ‘Well, I can’t come down. 3:00 in the morning.'”
“Said, ‘We’re going to blow the door if you don’t get down here.’ And she came down.”
“Put it off. I’m fine. Thanks for seeing us this late.”
“After reviewing the tape, FBI agents determine the girl is not Leah.”
“And they’re back to square one.”
“Time is of the essence in a child abduction investigation.”
“The FBI brings a crisis management capability which allows us to wrap a command post around an ongoing, fast-moving investigation.”
“By now, the FBI and Houston police fear Leah Henry is in the hands of a dangerously aggressive predator.”
“Within the first few hours of a child abduction, we’re aware that our victim is possibly being assaulted and may be killed, and that that first lead that comes in may be the most important lead that we get.”
“Agents re-interview the neighbor who last saw Leah alive and glean more details.”
“Their suspect is a white male in his mid-40s. His car, a white two-door hatchback. They release the new information so it will hit the morning newscast.”
“The first 24 hours is critical. Oftentimes, if that child is going to be murdered, it happens pretty quickly, within that first 24 hours.”
“Throughout the night, a desperate all-out effort is underway to find 11-year-old Leah Henry.”
“We spent all night looking and go to bed that night. It was just exhausting. But yeah, you wanted to be in motion. You wanted to be looking.”
“Tim Henry can’t sleep with the thought of his young daughter in the hands of a stranger.”
“It just never crossed my mind that people could even be monsters like that. I was afraid of monsters coming out of my closet or from under my bed. I didn’t think the world could actually consist of people that were just disgusting. I was in shock, I didn’t know what to do.”
“It’s been several hours since fifth grader Leah Henry went missing. And according to an eyewitness, she got into a small white hatchback just a block from her house.”
“Leah has been bound into submission by a strange man who’s driving her miles from home. It’s a terrifying journey, and she fears the worst is yet to come.”
“I don’t remember too much until the first time he touched…”
“He will be coming out this road. There’s only one way in, one way out.”
“All right, sweet, you go in this nice way. She’s going to get you to your parents.”
“Leah is quickly taken to the local hospital.”
“I knew I was okay and safe, but then at the same time, I just, I didn’t trust anybody. But I was so grateful at the same time that, you know, I was alive.”
“When backup units arrive, they make the dangerous drive down the road to the cabin.”
“When we actually got to the scene, we found him. He had already committed suicide.”
“With the law closing in, the kidnapper ends his life with a bullet to his brain.”
“Inside the vehicle, police find a badge, wallet, and stun gun. Inside the wallet, a driver’s license positively IDs Leah’s abductor as Gary Dale Cox, the man the FBI suspected.”
“It could have been a really, really bad situation had he started shooting. My fear is that, uh, Leah could have been injured or killed.”
“Inside the cabin, they find duct tape, rope, and zip ties, along with Leah’s notes describing the horrible things done to her. Her backpack holds the camera with the pictures she took to prove it.”
“Police and FBI agents are amazed at how close Cox came to getting away.”
“If I had delayed my response to that call for one or two minutes, maybe I would have passed him on the way. But I was not looking for a red vehicle, so I, pro, he probably would have drove right by me.”
“Back in Houston, Tim Henry hears the words he thought he might never hear.”
“We found her. She’s alive.”
“I think I dropped the phone. Then I went into the house and, uh, Linda was there, my brother was there, and his wife.”
“She’s alive?”
“Yeah.”
“You really go from just the depth of the spirit, ecstasy, boom. And it’s hard to, hard to imagine how that is, but I, I just, uh, we just jumped up.”
“Police officer was there.”
“Within 5 minutes, we were out of the house, down to the FBI headquarters.”
“They fly Tim and Linda Henry to Kerrville for a reunion with their daughter.”
“They gave me the best hugs that I’ve ever had. And we just sat there and choked up, teared up, cried.”
“I felt finally free of him. That once I was in their arms, he couldn’t hurt me. That they weren’t going to hurt anymore. That I was actually right there with them.”
“Miss you guys.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever been that happy. And uh, that’s true. I just, I can never think of another moment in life that has brought that kind of joy to me.”
“That’s all I wanted that day. That whole day that I was sitting in the back of his car, not knowing where he was driving to, all I wanted was just to be in their arms, to see them one more time. That’s all I had wished for. And it happened. My wishes came true.”
“A noisy homecoming crowd greets Leah and her family.”
“When we drove up to my house, there were so many people. So many people.”
“I had an uncontrollable smile on my face, literally. And everyone was comforting me. Everyone was showing me so much love and support. And I think that’s when I realized my family had never given up hope and I was found, and everything really did work out.”
“There’s no, no more rewarding, uh, feeling for a police officer and investigator than to return a child to, to our parents. That’s as good as it gets.”
“The rescue and safe return of Leah Henry is a tribute to her bravery, her family’s persistence, and those who work tirelessly to find her.”
“To, to be able to take somebody’s little girl back to them, um, where she’s going to be safe now, was, a, you know, an incredible moment for those of us that were involved.”
“People fighting for my life, people who didn’t even know me, and it makes such a big difference in the road to recovery.”
“My life actually feels complete and happy and something worth living for.”
